Imagine you’re on your way to dinner, walking down a decently busy street during the day. You’re using your new iPhone 16 Pro for directions before, out of nowhere, a masked individual on an e-bike whips around to your side and snatches you’re Desert Titanium baby and zooms off. All in seconds. This sounds like a one-off insane situation, but this is precisely what happened to Dimitar Stanimiroff last week in London, England. And he’s not alone…
Most recent statistics say a phone is stolen on average every 6 minutes in London, or about 64,000 annually. It’s so common that the City of London Police deployed special task forces to snuff out these gangs and even had to publish a blog post explaining how to protect your mobile device in public better.
Over the years, Apple has made impressive strides in implementing anti-theft measures like Activation Lock and inadvertent “parts pairing” rules. These features and others are meant to deter thieves and minimize situations like Stanimiroff’s. Is it enough?
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Stanimiroff took to LinkedIn to share his story. Despite the traumatic experience and the apparent loss of his expensive phone, the Met officer he reported the situation to said he “got lucky!” She explained to Stanimiroff that these criminals often attempt to run people over to snatch their phones, and many victims aren’t quick enough to dodge an e-bike traveling at speeds of up to 70 mph!
Stanimiroff could track the iPhone 16 Pro at a few different locations using Find My before it went dark. Unfortunately, when he shared the location details with the officer, she told him that because these crimes occur so frequently, they don’t have the resources to investigate them and usually close the cases the same day they’re received.
With the introduction of iOS 7 in 2013, Apple introduced Activation Lock, which prevents anyone from wiping data from an iPhone without the original owner’s Apple ID and password. Overnight, this made Apple devices significantly less appealing to thieves. They could no longer sell full-functioning devices to local pawn shops, eBay, Craigslist, etc., for serious profit, so they pivoted to the less fruitful parts market.
For years, the black market trade of iPhone parts got by unscathed. This was until around 2018 when Apple started digitally pairing the serial number of iPhone X’s battery to the serial number of the device itself, known as “parts pairing.” Unauthorized repair shops started noticing service warnings if the battery wasn’t replaced by Apple. With the iPhone 12, this expanded to more components like the screen, cameras, and Face ID sensors.
This led to significant controversy around DIY repairs. Despite Apple’s best efforts to fight and lobby legislation, Oregon and Colorado passed a Right to Repair bill that bans parts pairing completely. This went into effect on January 1, 2025. However, it is still allowed in the UK today.
It’s impossible to know what happens to every device that’s snatched from its owner. But thanks to recent police raids, we know that most don’t stay in London, and many end up overseas in Shenzhen, China, according to The Times—the same place many of them are made. If criminals can’t bypass any of the iPhones’ security features to wipe them clean, they are scrapped for parts and sold off to resellers and/or recycling plants.
Apple’s control over iPhone repairs has created a paradox of sorts. With new Right to Repair laws popping up in places like Oregon and Colorado, Apple’s parts pairing policy is looking a little shaky. If more states and the EU move against the policy in favor of DIY repairs, it will be interesting to see how that could further impact this situation.
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